Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Mosul Campaign Day 212 May 16 2017

The Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) were fighting over the areas
just north of the Old City district in west Mosul. The Federal Police claimed
they held 80% of Tamuz 17 and Iqtisadin. The former was declared freed on May
13, and the latter on May
14. The Iraqis often call areas cleared before they are. At the same time,
the Islamic State has constantly re-infiltrated places after they have left.

The Iraqi Air Force dropped
flyers over west Mosul once more. The leaflets told people the end of the
battle for the city was near, and that they should avoid using any cars or
motorcycles out of fear that they would be targeted as suspected vehicle bombs.

The Hashd were still gaining more ground in western Ninewa.
They took
four more villages in Sinjar and had a fifth surrounding. The goal is to take
Qayrawan, then go to Baaj, and finally reach the Syrian border. The move into
Sinjar brought criticism from Kurdish President Massoud Barzani who claimed
there was an agreement to keep the Hashd out of the district. Spokesman Ahmed
al-Asadi said
the Hashd wouldn’t respond to Barzani’s comments, and that they were
cooperating with the Peshmerga. Prime Minister Haider Abadi added
that Baghdad didn’t know about the Kurds’ concerns and a delegation would be
sent to work things out. Sinjar was under Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party
(KDP) authority before 2014. It abandoned the area before the Islamic State
arrived leading to the massacre of the Yazidis who lived there. The Kurdistan Workers
Party (PKK) entered from Syria and rescued the locals. That has made it all the
harder for the KDP to re-establish control over the area. Now it is worried
that the Hashd will enter the equation. Barzani can either have his Peshmerga
take the Yazidi towns before the Hashd reach them or continue to complain to
Baghdad in the hopes that it can convince the Hashd to pull back. This could
quickly turn into a flashpoint.

In May, Al
Monitor talked with former government adviser and Iraqi security analyst
Hisham al-Hashimi who was very critical of Baghdad’s announcements about the
war against the Islamic State. Hashimi told Al Monitor that the daily releases
by the ISF were nothing but propaganda that always exaggerated its success like
the number of IS fighters killed. The Joint
Operations Command provided another example when it claimed that 16,667
insurgents were killed during the Mosul operations. That was more than two-four
times higher than any estimate given for the number of fighters in Mosul before
the operation started in October 2016. Michael
Knights of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy had 2,000-3,000 IS
fighters, while Peter
Bergan of CNN had the number at 4,500-7,500 when the campaign began. In
January 2017, the ISF in Ninewa told the press there were 3,300
fighters left with the Defense Ministry saying there were
originally around 6,000. In that month, the Ministry also claimed approximately
3,400 IS members had been killed so far. While these figures are all on Mosul
and not Ninewa overall, there were not many IS fighters outside of the city.
Ninewa is mostly wide open territory, which the militants did not defend
because they would be exposed to air strikes. The Iraqis themselves were
talking about roughly 3,000 IS fighters killed by January. Somehow that
exploded to 16,000+ four months later. That was not the only problem.

The same Joint Operation Command release
had 679 car bombs destroyed in the Mosul battle. At the start of the campaign
it was said that the insurgents were launching dozens of vehicle bombs per day.
By January both the U.S.
and Iraqissaid
this was happening far less frequently. That didn’t stop the ISF from
constantly reporting large numbers of car bombs being destroyed each day. From
October 2016 to January 2017 the Iraqi forces claimed 949 car bombs were blown
up. From February to April when those types of attacks went down, the Iraqis
still reported 762 destroyed for a total of 1,711. The Joint Operations Command
figure might be a more realistic one, but because the Iraqis exaggerate so much
it’s impossible to tell. This is just another example of how the Iraqis have lost
credibility when speaking on these issues.

Finally, the International Organization for Migration and
other aid agencies are worried
about the coming summer and how that will affect the displaced (IDPs). Special
packages are being put together with fans, summer sheets, and cool boxes to
hand out to the IDPs to deal with the heat. Some people in IDP camps are
already complaining about the difficulties they are facing as the spring is
ending and the next season is coming. IDPs are already facing enough problems,
the scorching Iraqi summer will only add to them.

About Me

Musings On Iraq was started in 2008 to explain the political, economic, security and cultural situation in Iraq via original articles and interviews. I have written for the Jamestown Foundation, Tom Ricks’ Best Defense at Foreign Policy and the Daily Beast, and was responsible for a chapter in the book Volatile Landscape: Iraq And Its Insurgent Movements. My work has been published in Iraq via NRT, AK News, Al-Mada, Sotaliraq, All Iraq News, and Ur News all in Iraq. I was interviewed on BBC Radio 5, Radio Sputnik, CCTV and TRT World News TV, and have appeared in CNN, the Christian Science Monitor, The National, Columbia Journalism Review, Mother Jones, PBS’ Frontline, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Institute for the Study of War, Radio Free Iraq, Rudaw, and others. I have also been cited in Iraq From war To A New Authoritarianism by Toby Dodge, Imagining the Nation Nationalism, Sectarianism and Socio-Political Conflict in Iraq by Harith al-Qarawee, ISIS Inside the Army of Terror by Michael Weiss and Hassan Hassahn, The Rise of the Islamic State by Patrick Cocburn, and others. If you wish to contact me personally my email is: motown67@aol.com